


This is Just to Say

by fivefootnothing



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-15
Updated: 2010-02-15
Packaged: 2017-10-23 19:47:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/254183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fivefootnothing/pseuds/fivefootnothing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I have eaten<br/>the plums<br/>that were in<br/>the icebox</p><p>and which<br/>you were probably<br/>saving<br/>for breakfast</p><p>Forgive me<br/>they were delicious<br/>so sweet<br/>and so cold</p>
            </blockquote>





	This is Just to Say

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the William Carlos Williams poem.

_I have taken  
the knife  
that was on  
your night stand  
and which  
you were probably  
saving for protection  
I’m sorry  
it was dangerous  
so heavy  
and so cold_

*~*~*

He’d have preferred a gentler approach to the situation, a simple talking things through, but with Erimem, he understood such even-handed tactics were mostly futile. Still, he sought out the best time to broach the affair, but each moment he uncovered a perfect segue into the subject, Peri would pop in asking why the seventh level food machine had suddenly decided to produce strawberry milk rather than chocolate. Or Antranak would get into the Dimensional Stabilizers and cause the ceilings to drop to four feet above the floor. Or the TARDIS’s Time Rotor would suddenly grind to a halt and he’d have to set about repairing her while the blue box remained floating and helpless in the void of the Time Vortex.

There was never enough time.

He’d second-guess himself, ponder whether this was the best course of action, assuring himself of its inevitability despite the inkling of indecision plaguing his mind. It wasn’t his place, but it was. He oughtn’t dictate, but he ought. The final question, the crux of the situation, and the reason why he embarked on a foolhardy mission, was whether he felt safe with the current conditions aboard his ship.

He did not.

The vanishing came quickly and without any amount of warning. Peri occupied Erimem with more reading lessons, and he’d easily slipped into Erimem’s bedroom without detection. He found it rather heartening, the way the Egyptian princess took to learning new subjects with the same tackling vitality as she did in planning out the best way to undermine an enemy. But he knew that someday she would regret the acts done with the object, the lives lost during its use, and he thought it best to remove the possibility before it became horrible, irreversible fact.

She didn’t notice its disappearance until days later, while cleaning her room. At first, she assumed she’d misplaced it, but after digging through her things (and she didn’t own that many) she’d discovered that she did not. Then she’d sought out Peri and asked whether she’d seen it, and Peri assured her friend that she didn’t. Finally, she approached the Doctor, fervently inquiring about her missing knife.

He pleaded for calm, and then explained to her a key tenet of the TARDIS interior’s existence. Weapons could not be used in such an environment, and there have been instances of such objects completely disappearing from within the TARDIS itself. After all, temporal grace was a very tricky thing to maintain.


End file.
